BOB

Andrew woke up with a start, he knew what had happened and his heart sank, the sound of the glass shattering downstairs had done the same to his nerves. It had come in. After weeks of watching and stalking him, the creature had finally decided to break in. The patio doors, made completely of glass, provided it with the perfect entrance.

Andrew laid there in bed, in the blackness only illuminated by the small amount of clear light that the moon provided through the space between the curtains. He listened for the creature, listened to see if it was inside, secretly praying that everything would be silent. The terrifying cracking of glass under its feet confirmed his worst fear, it had finally made its way into his home.

With this crushing realisation Andrew, now shaking, grabbed his titanium baseball bat and crept downstairs deeper into the darkness, determined to confront this thing once and for all, secretly hoping though, that it would run away when it saw him as it normally did. Andrew stood at the bottom of the stairs, listening. At first all he heard was the cracking of glass under the creature's feet, then, for the first time, Andrew heard the creature, breathing heavily as if its throat was blocked by phlegm. The hideous creature snarled and clicked, gradually getting closer to Andrew.

Now out of the kitchen, the creature was finally off of the glass. It walked almost silently now, strangely more agile than it looked, especially considering how clumsily it ran away. Andrew realised what he had to do. He grasped his weapon tighter and... Froze, unable to move. He knew he needed to attack it but he just couldn't. Its teeth, its eyes, its skin. Human, but not quite. The creature was in the living room now and edging closer by the second yet Andrew was still too terrified to move, even if it didn't have arms, this creature was the embodiment of terror to Andrew.

Andrew stood at the bottom of the stairs, shaking. He heard the creature getting ever closer, the sickening sound of its distorted breathing amplified by the almost pitch darkness. The creature was nearly at Andrew, he had one chance to kill it and he wasn't going to waste it.

BOB picture taken by Anthony Rose

The creature stepped into the doorway to the stairs, Andrew was hidden just to the left. He swung at fall force, hitting the creature in the chest with the bat. The creature staggered back, then stopped and looked at Andrew, its tiny wild eyes staring into Andrew's soul. Andrew felt a deep fear of the creature unlike anything he had ever experienced. The creature then let out a gurgled hiss at Andrew, baring all of its sickening, deformed teeth in the process.

The creature kicked Andrew in the gut, winding him. Andrew fell to the floor in pain, unable to breathe. Andrew rolled onto his back and scuffled up against the wall just behind him. The creature watched him until he reached the wall, at which point it walked towards him and looked down at Andrew as if it were judging him, lying there, helpless. The creature stamped on his shin, snapping the bone. Tears began to stream from Andrew's eyes, the pain so intense Andrew thought he was going to vomit.

Andrew, now incapacitated, had nowhere to go and no way to fight. The creature placed its foot on Andrew's stomach, pressing down, ripping into his flesh with its long, dirty toenails. With the creature's foot now completely inside his stomach, Andrew started to cough blood. Tears streamed down his face. He passed out from the pain, and then passed away. The creature loomed over what was by now his bloody corpse. The creature descended its face toward Andrew's and then tore away a bloody piece of flesh from Andrew's chin, dislocating one side of his jaw in the process. The creature continued to tear and eviscerate Andrew's corpse until everything the creature could stomach had been devoured. The creature then left... Calmly. Silently. With a pure and deep hatred in its heart. The creature left, the same way it came in, through the broken patio doors...